Happy Birthday Eric!

We celebrated Eric's birthday on Wednesday, October 27. He turned 49. I gave him new socks (that is what he asked for) and a new duffle bag to carry his running stuff. Abby and Miranda got him a new red tie and made him a birthday cake that looked like a bee hive. It was very cute. It was supposed to be cupcakes, but we decided that a cake would be easier. We had a family dinner of hamburgers and french fries, Eric's choice. He wanted to try the out the pickles we made this year.

This is a close-up view of the beehive.  The hexagon thingies are supposed to be the cells bees will use to store their honey.


Eric just blew out his candle.  I think he is just glad that there weren't more to blow out!

This is a photo of Miranda's cake she made for a friend.  It may look like french fries and ketchup, but those are really pound cake pieces and red frosting.  Looks good, don't it?

Wake up Call

This morning I was awakened at 5:10  by the phone. It was the sherrifs office doing a reverse 911 call. The message said that there was an arsonist in the area. The arsonist had started 6 haystack fires. I was instructed to check my property and report any suspicious activity to the sherrif's office. I did get up and check things out by peeking out the windows. After a quick prayer, I was not as worried because we don't have a haystack. Why do abnormal things always happen when Eric is out of town? It was not a good way to start the day...and an hour before my alarm was set to go off.

Other people in the community have been getting reverse 911 calls because there has been a mountain lion roaming around some neighborhoods. I did hear on the news today that a mountain lion was hit be a car between Firth and Blackfoot. I haven't hear if it is the same one that has been on an adventure in town.

Bee Action

  Eric looked out the window late this afternoon and spotted some peculiar behavior going on with our Daisy hive. We might have expected to see the bees out enjoying the evening if the weather would have been warmer, but it was kind of chilly.  When we looked closer, we found that the bees seemed to be locked in mortal combat with each other.

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Maybe if you look closely you can see some groups of bees fighting.  We watched for a while to be sure we knew what was going on.  We finally decided with Eric's brother's consultation that Daisy was under attack from some other bees trying to rob the hive of its honey!!  Yikes!

Every once in a while a ball of bees would fall off the porch and end up in the grass.  There were a bunch of dead bees in the grass in front of Daisy.  We hope these dead bees were the robbers and not Daisy's defenders/warriors.

 

We set a water sprinkler near Daisy's entrance for a while and everything calmed down rather quickly.  Then we put an entrance reducer on the hive so Daisy could defend herself better.  We'll have to keep an eye on things to see if normalcy returns.

St. George 2010

Well St. George was a lot different this time compared to two years ago.  Then, the weather was FREEZING and WET.  This time it was record breaking heat.  How would just normal be??

Anyway, I (Eric) ran the marathon on Saturday, 2 October 2010.  I was hoping for a finishing time that would qualify me for entrance into the Boston Marathon.  My goal was 3:35:59, but missed it by a lot.  I finished at 3:57:47 (just 22 minutes off, give me a break!!).  I can give a bunch of excuses for the poor finishing time, but I won't.  But in case you're interested, a few of them are 1) foot surgery earlier this spring, 2) carrying around too much weight, 3) a week in Italy a week before the marathon, 4) record breaking heat during the race.  Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't trade the week in Italy with Marie for anything.  That was a blast.  But I wouldn't suggest it as a training aid.

Marie and I took Mindy, Abby, and Paige and Leslie with us to St. George.  I had fun, and I think the others did too.  We really didn't do much except marathon stuff.  Mayby next time I can convince those who go to maybe go to Zion or see some of the other sites.  St. George is a neat place.

Here are some pictures:

This is my (Eric's) foot in a sock/shoe made be Vibram.  It is the new craze in running.  People actually wear these to run in.

Here I am coming down the stretch, trying hard to beat this nice lady.

Crossing the line (finally!!!)

After the race, I shouldn't have sat down because at this point I didn't think I could get back up.  Will someone please help that poor man??

Here is a picture of Abby, carrying Leslie, and me at the condo.  I wish we would have taken a shot of the whole group, but . . .